<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images</div></div></div><ul><li>The US, Canada, and Mexico are nearing a deal on a new version of the North American Free Trade Agreement.</li><li>While all three countries are hopeful, issues concerning cars and a "sunset" clause remain.</li><li>The timing of a deal could add new political risks.</li></ul>The US, Canada, and Mexico appear to be closing in on a new version of the massive North American Trade Agreement, but a series of stumbling blocks could still trip up any deal.President Donald Trump's executive order - signed just days after taking office - <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-to-sign-executive-order-to-renegotiate-nafta-2017-1">began the NAFTA renegotiation</a> process in January 2017. Official talks <a href="https://ustr.gov/about-us/policy-offices/press-office/press-releases/2017/july/ustr-announces-first-round-nafta">kicked off in August</a>.Initially, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/nafta-talks-are-going-into-their-seventh-round-canada-isnt-optimistic/2018/02/24/59cb7140-1732-11e8-930c-45838ad0d77a_story.html">the outlook was gloomy</a>. Numerous rounds of talks produced <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/canadian-officials-believe-trump-will-pull-us-out-of-nafta-2018-1">little progress toward a deal</a>. Negotiators appeared far apart. At one point, Canada said it looked likely that Trump would blow up the whole deal.In just the past two months, however, optimism and progress have quietly taken over, according to US officials and reports. The remaining issues: rules pertaining to major industries, and a shifting political landscape in each country.Two of <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-trade-nafta/mexico-says-nafta-deal-reasonably-close-talks-not-easy-idUSKBN1HX2NJ">the major negotiators for Mexico</a> - Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray and Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo - summed up just how close and how far a new trade deal remains. "I think we are reasonably close," Videgaray said on Thursday after talks with the US. "Certainly this has been a very good week.""It will depend on our abilities and creativity," he said. "We are trying to do our best, but there are still a lot of things pending."<h2>What is NAFTA?</h2>NAFTA, the trade pact among the US, Canada, and Mexico, aims to reduce trade barriers between the member countries to encourage economic prosperity throughout the continent. <div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image">Joe Marquette/APPresident Clinton holds an apple while attending a North American Free Trade Agreement trade fair on the South Lawn of the White House Wednesday Oct. 20, 1993. From left are: Janet White of the Washington Apple Growers Association; Rep. Jay Inslee, D-Washington; Clinton and Ellen Terpstra, president of the International Apple Institute.</div></div></div>Approved in 1994, NAFTA aimed to reduce barriers between the nations so each could focus production on their specialization. Both President Bill <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=eyPhAwAAQBAJ&amp;pg=PA1486&amp;lpg=PA1486&amp;dq=NAFTA+means+jobs.+American+jobs,+and+good-paying+American+jobs.+If+I+didn%E2%80%99t+believe+that,+I+wouldn%E2%80%99t+support+this+agreement.%E2%80%9D&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=YIojJL3fWt&amp;sig=O0rrqVNxKUdShk3hzu3zZ-HiYbU&amp;hl=en&amp;sa=X&amp;ved=0ahUKEwi408iRqOrRAhUriFQKHeP9CKIQ6AEIcjAS#v=onepage&amp;q=NAFTA%20means%20jobs.%20American%20jobs%2C%20and%20good-paying%20American%20jobs.%20If%20I%20didn%E2%80%99t%20believe%20that%2C%20I%20wouldn%E2%80%99t%20support%20this%20agreement.%E2%80%9D&amp;f=false">Clinton</a> and George H.W. <a href="http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=21784">Bush, whose administrations negotiated the original deal, argued</a> it would help push the US toward a globalized economy that focused on growing industries of the future.But in the two-plus decades since, a protectionist attitude toward trade has taken hold in the US. <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/terrible-president-trump-nafta-article-1.3107104">Trump called NAFTA</a> the "worst trade deal in the history of the country." Progressive Democrats have <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/05/01/politics/sherrod-brown-trump-nafta-trade/index.html">also been critical</a> of the deal.Economists found that since it came into force, NAFTA has led to <a href="https://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/REST_a_00587#.WI98I7YrIln">a concentrated decline</a> for some manufacturing industries. But studies have shown the deal has also <a href="https://ustr.gov/about-us/policy-offices/press-office/fact-sheets/archives/2001/june/nafta-good-farmers-good-america">boosted American agriculture</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/30/business/economy/nafta-may-have-saved-many-autoworkers-jobs.html?_r=0">other industries</a> at the same time.<h2>Closing in on a deal</h2>Negotiators have broken through most consequentially over the past four weeks.The major trade negotiators for the three countries - US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, and Guajardo - have said they are <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/nafta-ministers-meet-washington-1.4608229">nearing an "agreement in principle."</a>"If there's a real effort made to try to close out and to compromise and do some of the things we all know we should do, I'm optimistic we can get something done in principle in the next little bit," Lighthizer said late last month.Since then, negotiators have been holed up in Washington, DC, in an attempt to iron out the broad strokes of an agreement.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Getty Images/PoolUS Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and President Donald Trump</div></div></div>Trump, who spent much of the past year suggesting <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-tweets-on-steel-tariffs-nafta-canada-mexico-2018-3">the US could leave the deal</a> at any moment, has appeared upbeat about a deal."NAFTA as you know is moving along," Trump said Tuesday. "I could make a deal very quickly, but I'm not sure that's in the best interest of the United States. We'll see what happens, but we're doing very well."It's unclear what exactly the new deal would look like, but Trump has long wanted stronger <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-nafta-renegotiations-begin-2017-8">protections for US manufacturing companies</a>.<h2>The issues left to resolve</h2>Rules on things like automobiles and steel, as well as the US's desire for what's known as a "sunset clause," could still derail any deal.The Trump administration has long sought to tighten rules on the "point of origin" of automobiles. The rule allows a car to be <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-trade-nafta-autos/nafta-autos-origin-rules-could-hurt-u-s-sales-and-exports-study-idUSKBN1HX2Q8">moved to the US without a tariff</a> if a certain amount of the vehicle was built in a NAFTA country. Mexico and Canada have competing views on what the threshold should be to qualify.<a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-trade-nafta/canada-sees-progress-on-nafta-auto-rules-steel-tariffs-loom-idUSKBN1HW2R8">Freeland told reporters</a> Wednesday that the negotiators are making headway on the issue. "I think we made some good progress," Freeland said. "We're very much working on a set of proposals based on the creative ideas the US came up with in March and I think there was good constructive progress."<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image">Bill Pugliano / Stringer / Getty Images</div></div></div>Canada and Mexico, meanwhile, oppose a sunset clause. They argue it would keep a permanent air of uncertainty over the trade deal. Such a clause would bring the three countries <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-14/ross-says-u-s-wants-five-year-sunset-provision-for-nafta">to the table every five years</a> to either terminate or continue the deal. To invest heavily in Canada and Mexico, a business would want to be sure that the level of access to the US - a massive market - granted by NAFTA would be assured.The <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-canada-cenbank-wilkins-interview/bank-of-canada-eyes-overall-economy-even-as-debt-nafta-weigh-wilkins-idUSKBN1FS370">Bank of Canada has cited</a> the uncertainty around the current NAFTA talks as an economic drag on the country."The Bank's outlook takes into account a small benefit to Canada's economy from stronger US demand arising from recent tax changes," the BOC <a href="https://www.bankofcanada.ca/2018/01/fad-press-release-2018-01-17/">said in their January statement</a>. "However, as uncertainty about the future of NAFTA is weighing increasingly on the outlook, the Bank has incorporated into its projection additional negative judgment on business investment and trade."<h2>The clock is ticking</h2>Many analysts say the progress does not guarantee any deal will be struck.Perhaps the biggest issue facing the negotiators is timing. Trump and Lighthizer are using Trade Promotion Authority to renegotiate NAFTA, which allows Congress to fast track a new deal's approval. That also comes with constraints."The main one from a timing perspective is that the Congress requires a six-month consultation period before an up-or-down vote (no amendments)," Chris Kreuger, a strategist at Cowen Washington Research Group, said Wednesday. "That means that the treaty has to be finished by May 1 for this Congress to get a vote. If not, the negotiations could be subject to a Democratic-controlled House ... which is a much different narrative and negotiation."Also looming is the issue of the Mexican presidential election on July 1. The economic adviser for the leading candidate, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/leading-mexican-presidential-candidate-would-respect-nafta-deal-1524766683">said Wednesday</a> that the frontrunner would respect a new NAFTA if a deal is reached prior to the election. But, as always, there could be changes between April and July. <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jared-kushner-ivanka-trump-secret-deal-planned-parenthood-cecile-richards-make-trouble-2018-4">Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump tried to cut a secret deal with Planned Parenthood - here's what happened</a></h3> <div> </div> </div>

The US, Mexico, and Canada are quietly closing in on a historic new trade agreement

Nine American Mormons died in a brutal ambush in Mexico. Here's the untold story of the hunt for justice by those left behind.

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">(US Air Force photo/Staff Sgt. Jensen Stidham)Capt. Michael Slotten, a 61st Fighter Squadron F-35 student pilot, climbs into an F-35 Lighting II at Luke Air Force Base, Arizona, July 7, 2017.</div></div></div><ul><li>The Air Force has been warning about its growing pilot shortage for some time.</li><li>But a government report has found that the Air Force, Marine Corps, and Navy all have significant shortfalls.</li><li>The service branches' stop-gap approaches have created additional problems for pilots, hurting quality of life and affecting retention, the report warns.</li></ul> Air Force officials have been warning about <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/air-force-pilot-shortage-crisis-getting-worse-2017-11" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the force's dire pilot shortage</a>, and a recent Government Accountability Office report illustrates just how bad the shortfall has gotten.The <a href="https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/691192.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">report</a> assesses the gaps between the actual number of fighter pilots that the Air Force, Marine Corps, and Navy have and the number of positions they are authorized to have.Each service branch reported fighter-pilot shortages that have grown worse in recent years. "Service officials attributed these gaps to aircraft readiness challenges, reduced training opportunities, and increased attrition of fighter pilots due to career dissatisfaction," the report says.The Air Force had at least 92% of its fighter-pilot positions filled between 2006 and 2010, an 8% gap, and 104% of what it needed in 2011, a 4% surplus. But the gap has grown since 2012 and is currently the biggest of the three military branches, at 27%.The Air Force, which has undertaken a number of training and retention initiatives, projected its shortfall to last through fiscal year 2023.<h2>Growing shortfalls and falling retention</h2><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/usairforce/15226534250/in/photolist-ptJuug-qgGdgo-prYGQC-a4TSMR-pcvYq7-pu1PBX-qkoPfm-pZbNod-pZknfP-pjLnSm-r58wJ8-pjZAM2-a4TMiX-qZAxLf-egbLEZ-iTdiJq-pjZxhr-a4TSzT-a4TKDZ-a4THWP-ptZ5dG-a4WCWJ-a4TMUX-pcvY9A-CuZLN7-EGu9rQ-LMCyBb-LUcfdE-a4TJRR-fhdcZo-a4WHzs-a4WFLA-a4WCLE-a4TQYg-a4WHES-a4TUSx-wrRBrc-DAZWoA-pcwrzA-BJW8wn-a4TUXa-qyGQ2U-LQ9cUB-Ldxawz-Ldxarp-JRsqgB-KF4qAL-KB3jaa-KhLVTU-KF4q9d">US Air Force photo</a>Maj. Gen. Jay Silveria, U.S. Air Force Warfare Center commander, walks out to an F-35A Lightning II with Lt. Col. Matt Renbarger, 58th Fighter Squadron commander, before his final qualification flight Sept. 26, 2014, at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla.</div></div></div>Each branch has different levels at which the difference between authorized positions and actual staff levels becomes a shortage. Air Force officials told the GAO that "their established practice is that pilot communities with less than 100 percent of authorizations are considered to be insufficiently staffed."Changing authorization levels led to <a href="https://www.military.com/daily-news/2018/04/12/crisis-one-fourth-fighter-pilot-jobs-not-filled-watchdog-finds.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">an excess</a> in some Air Force career fields in 2011, but an increase in authorized positions in the past few years has led to a growing shortfall among fighter pilots - from 192, or 5% of authorized positions, that year to 1,005, or 27% of authorized positions, in 2017. (The Air Force said at the end of 2017 that its total shortage was "<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/air-force-pilot-shortage-crisis-getting-worse-2017-11" target="_blank" rel="noopener">around 2,000</a>" pilots.)"According to briefing documents prepared by the Air Force, this gap is concentrated among fighter pilots with fewer than 8 years of experience," the report notes.Air Force officials told the GAO that between 2006 and 2017, "fighter pilot gaps were generally limited to non-operational positions, such as staff assignments at Air Force headquarters or combatant commands."But the GAO also found that the Air Force had been unable to fill all its operational positions since fiscal year 2014, with the gap between the operational positions it needed to fill and the actual staffing levels it had growing from 39 pilots, or 1% of authorizations, in 2014 to 399 pilots, or 13%, in 2017.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">GAOThe Air Force's fighter-pilot shortfall has grown significantly over the past several years.</div></div></div>Several factors have contributed to these shortfalls, in particular reductions to overall active-duty military end strength.Service officials said that personnel reductions after the 2008 drawdown in Iraq and cuts to funding stemming from the 2011 Budget Control Act both helped reduce the number of fighter pilots in the military.The Air Force shed 206 fighter pilots in order to meet initial demand for pilots of unmanned aerial systems in 2011 and 2012 and then lost 54 more to early-retirement incentives in 2014 and 2015. That was compounded by changes to force structure - the decline in active and reserve Air Force fighter squadrons from 134 in 1989 to 55 in 2017 has reduced the opportunities newly trained pilots have to gain flying experience.These factors have <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/air-force-has-a-pilot-shortage-due-to-lack-of-training-resources-2017-10" target="_blank" rel="noopener">helped create a bottleneck</a> in the Air Force's training pipeline. The service has more pilots entering than it has resources to train. According to the GAO report, between 2006 and 2017 the Air Force trained 12% fewer new fighter pilots than its target amount."Fighter pilots told us that the need to prioritize the staffing of experienced pilots to deploying squadrons has limited the number of experienced personnel available to train newer pilots at home stations," the report says.A fighter pilot needs about five years of training to be qualified to lead flights, which costs between about $3 million to $11 million depending on the type of aircraft they're being trained to fly, according to Air Force officials.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">GAO</div></div></div>Those training issues are exacerbated by the reduction in aircraft, as longer maintenance times for legacy aircraft, like the F-16 or F-15, leave fewer aircraft available for training. (A shortage of maintainer crew members <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/air-force-adding-maintainers-but-training-and-experience-take-longer-2018-3" target="_blank" rel="noopener">has also hamstrung the Air Force</a>, though it has made progress adding more of those personnel.)The services have also struggled to retain pilots.The GAO found that the number of Air Force pilots signing retention contracts fell from 63% in 2013 to 35% in 2017 - despite the service increasing its maximum aviation bonus contract to $225,000 at the start of 2013, which was the highest amount offered by any of the military service branches.<h2>Stop-gap measures</h2>Officials from the service branches told the GAO they had used various tactics to address their pilot shortfalls, including longer and more frequent deployments, putting senior pilots in junior positions, and "prioritizing staffing fighter pilots to flying positions that require fighter pilot-specific technical skills."The service branches has also tried to compensate for fighter-pilot shortages by drawing on pilots from other career fields.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">US Air Force/Master Sgt. Jeffrey AllenF-16 Fighting Falcons from the Arizona Air National Guard's 162nd Wing fly an air-to-air training mission against student pilots April 8, 2015.</div></div></div>The Air Force, for example, has drawn on mobility pilots - those that fly cargo and refueling aircraft - to fill instructor roles for basic training to free up fighter pilots for duties elsewhere.But fliers and squadron leaders told the GAO that these measures have had deleterious effects. Pilots and squadron leaders also said that some of these efforts to mitigate pilot shortages had helped drive down retentionA high operational tempo has limited the opportunities senior pilots have to train with junior pilots, which in turn limits the opportunities the service branches have to grow the number of pilots with specific qualifications. This also cuts into the services' ability to rebuild readiness. Air Force officials said "high deployment rates ... have resulted in less time for squadrons to complete their full training requirements because high deployment rates mean that there are fewer aircraft available for training at home stations."Moreover, increasing individual deployments undercut family stability, pilots said, affecting satisfaction with their careers.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image">(US Air Force photo/Tech. Sgt. Manuel J. Martinez)Maj. Tyler Ellison, a Thunderbirds pilot, administers the oath of enlistment to enlist Florida's newest airmen during the Sun 'n Fun International Fly-in and Expo Air Show at Lakeland, Florida, April, 25, 2015.</div></div></div>The Air Force has taken steps to mitigate the effects the pilot shortage has had on pilots' quality of life.It has stood up teams dedicated to finding and implementing dozens of initiatives to reduce the fighter-pilot shortage."For example, as the result of one initiative, 126 contractors have been placed in fighter squadrons to assist with administrative tasks and reduce workload for fighter pilots," the GAO notes.Air Force training squadrons have also taken steps to better apportion resources, including consolidating instructors among training units and altering the training process and syllabus, according to <a href="http://aviationweek.com/defense/severe-f-16-instructor-pilot-shortage-takes-toll-training" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a February report by Aviation Week</a>, but those shifts still put a strain on pilots and aircraft and represented "a leap into the unknown" for the units.The GAO report also noted that the service branches had not reevaluated fighter-squadron requirements to reflect change conditions, the increased workload, and the effects of the increasing use of unmanned aircraft."Air Force officials told us that metrics that inform squadron requirements ... have not been increased because the Air Force is instead prioritizing the effort to recapitalize its fleet of fighter aircraft," the report said, adding that officials said they were also reassessing fighter-pilots' nonoperational requirements, focusing on finding which ones could be reassigned to other pilots.The report made recommendations for each branch, advising the Air Force to reevaluate those squadron requirements, "to include updating current assumptions of fighter pilot workload, and assessing the impact of future incorporation of [unmanned aerial systems] platforms into combat aviation." <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/f-22-most-dangerous-jet-fighter-20-years-united-states-air-force-2017-9">Watch the F-22 in action - the most dangerous jet fighter in the US Air Force for the last 20 years</a></h3> <div> </div> </div>

The US Air Force is short more than one-quarter of the fighter pilots it needs, according to a government report

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table full"><div><div class="image"></div></div></div>Johnny Manziel is great.
Sports is entertainment, and Manziel is an entertainer in a league that has a frustrating aversion to outgoing personalities. We'd love nothing more than to see him ripping up NFL defenses every week.
But Manziel <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/johnny-manziel-benched-2014-8">losing the Cleveland Browns quarterback competition to Brian Hoyer</a> is not a good thing. The numbers suggests that rookies who win the starting job in Week 1 turn out to be better players than their peers. In addition, the recent track record of 1st-round picks who fail to start in Week 1 is worrisome.
In the last seven years the conventional wisdom about how rookie quarterbacks should be integrated into the NFL has changed.
NFL teams used to treat rookie quarterbacks as apprentices, sitting them on the bench for months until they were completely ready to play. The theory used to be that throwing rookies into the fire would hinder their development. Was this true?
We looked at the performance of 1st-round quarterbacks from 1999 to 2009. Using <a href="http://www.footballperspective.com/draft-value-chart/">Chase Stuart's expected draft value data</a> (which assigns a value to every draft position) and ProFootballReference's <a href="http://www.pro-football-reference.com/play-index/psl_finder.cgi?request=1&amp;match=combined&amp;year_min=1999&amp;year_max=2014&amp;season_start=1&amp;season_end=5&amp;age_min=0&amp;age_max=99&amp;league_id=&amp;team_id=&amp;is_active=&amp;is_hof=&amp;pos_is_qb=Y&amp;c1stat=av&amp;c1comp=gt&amp;c1val=0&amp;c2stat=&amp;c2comp=gt&amp;c2val=&amp;c3stat=&amp;c3comp=gt&amp;c3val=&amp;c4stat=&amp;c4comp=gt&amp;c4val=&amp;order_by=av&amp;draft=0&amp;draft_year_min=1936&amp;draft_year_max=2014&amp;type=&amp;draft_round_min=0&amp;draft_round_max=99&amp;draft_slot_min=1&amp;draft_slot_max=500&amp;draft_pick_in_round=0&amp;draft_league_id=&amp;draft_team_id=&amp;college_id=all&amp;conference=any&amp;draft_pos_is_qb=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_rb=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_wr=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_te=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_rec=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_t=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_g=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_c=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_ol=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_dt=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_de=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_dl=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_ilb=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_olb=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_lb=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_cb=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_s=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_db=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_k=Y&amp;draft_pos_is_p=Y">"approximate value" stat</a> (an advanced metric that quantifies a player's total value), we looked at how all these QBs performed relative to expectations. 
It turned out that the seven rookies who started in Week 1 from 1999 to 2009 were worth 78% more than their expected value based on draft position. The rookies who sat in Week 1 were worth 46% more than their expected value.
<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image"><a title_source="Tony Manfred/Business Insider" title_caption="" class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/53f4c327eab8ea9a2ff7d189-960/screen shot 2014-08-20 at 11.17.51 am.png"></a>Tony Manfred/Business Insider</div></div></div>
The guys who convinced their teams that they were good enough to start in Week 1 generally turned out to be slightly better players than those who didn't.
There are a bunch of complicating factors here.
Stuart only uses the first five years of a player's career in his draft data (<a href="http://www.footballperspective.com/creating-a-draft-value-chart-part-ii/">check out the whole methodology here</a>), so we only used the each quarterback's total approximate value over the first five years of his career. As a result, late-bloomers like Aaron Rodgers (who didn't start as a rookie) get penalized.
The sample size is small, so massive busts like JaMarcus Russell (82% worse than expected) and massive hits like Joe Flacco (370% better than expected) had a disproportionate impact on the numbers. That being said, the NFL's most notorious busts (Russell, Akili Smith, Cade McNown, Brady Quinn) all failed to start in Week 1.
You also have to understand that this was a different era.
Between 1999 and 2009, only seven of the 31 quarterbacks taken in the first round of the draft started in Week 1. Aaron Rodgers, Eli Manning, Ben Roethlisberger, and Jay Cutler all sat in Week 1.
In general, the guys who started in Week 1 were better during this period. But plenty of players sat in Week 1 and went on to be stars.
Today, rookie quarterbacks who are picked in the first round are expected to start.
Between 2010 and 2013, seven of the 11 QBs taken in the first round started in Week 1. Here's the breakdown of 1st-round rookie quarterbacks:
<ul>
<li>Started Week 1 (7 players): Sam Bradford, Cam Newton, Andrew Luck, Robert Griffin, Ryan Tannehill, Brandon Weeden, E.J. Manuel</li>
<li>Sat Week 1 (4 players): Tim Tebow, Jake Locker, Blaine Gabbert, Christian Ponder</li>
</ul>
The guys is the first group are generally better than those in the second. Tebow and Gabbert are busts, and the jury is still out Locker and Ponder.
We're in an era when it's unusual for 1st-round rookies to sit on the bench. And the guys who have sat on the bench during this period haven't faired well when they've eventually played.
Again, the sample size is small. There's also a possibility that Manziel is being benched for reasons that have little to do with football. But at the end of the day, history tells us that failing to win the starting job is a bad sign.

Not Starting In Week 1 Is An Ominous Sign For Johnny Manziel

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image">REUTERS/Natalie Behring</div></div></div>Goldman Sachs has promoted 425 people to managing director."Our new Managing Directors represent the best of our firm's dedication to excellence, leadership and client service, and we wish them continued success in their careers," Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein said in a statement.It's a big deal to be named a managing director. The title is just one step below "partner," which is one of the most highly-coveted titles in investment banking. The next class of MDs won't be selected until 2017. In 2013, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/goldman-managing-director-selection-2013-3">Goldman changed its managing director selection process</a> from every year to every two years. That year, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/goldman-managing-director-class-2013-11">280 people</a> made the cut.The following individuals have been promoted:Catherine Addona-Peña Alokik Advani Sam Agnew Daniel Ahern Murtaza Ahmed Fusae Akamatsu Phil Almond Ana Alonso Roy Appelman Juliano Arruda Alex Ashwal Daniel Avery Misty Bailey Tom Barkes Jose Barreto Sushil Bathija Gregoire Baudot Olivier Belaich Sharon Bell Allison Beller Christine Benson Schwartzstein Sam Berberian Todd Berger Sandy Bernhardt Greg Berube Shashi Bhushan (Bengaluru) Lyla Bibi Julie Billings Alexander Blanchard Tristan Blood Katherine Bloom Alexander Blostein John Blythe Andrea Bonini Vijay Borkar Jean-Pierre Boudrias Dyson Bowditch Rhett Brewer Sean Brewer Cameron Brien Tyler Brooke Marios Broustas Melissa Brown Jacob Buitelaar Jason Burgess Manuel Camacho Tim Campbell Eliot Camplisson Susana Cao Miranda Nicholas Chan Sorubh Chandani Amy Chang Dennis Chang Scott Chastain Scott Chen (IBD) Yu Chikami Vikram Chima Sung Cho Caroline Chu Simon Clarke Ray Clifford Jorge Combe William Connolly Ron Cortina Daniela Costa Yasmine Coupal Patricia Creedon Brian Culang Michelle Daly Ranga Dattatreya Christopher Daur Brian DeCenzo Alexis Deladerriere Robert Devens Devanshu Dhyani Scott Dias Johanna Diaz Simon Dickinson Andrew DiMaria Darren Dixon Terence Donnelly Christopher Droege Lindsay Drucker Mann Frank Drury Caroline Dunne Steven Edwards (Internal Audit) Jeffrey Egee Naoko Ehara Inna Elyashkevich Jason English Andrew Erekson Joris Esch Ana Estrada Cristina Estrada Owain Evans Julia Feldman Jing Feng Albert Ferng Val Feygin Dan Fishman Dennis Fleck Terence Flynn Ian Foster (IBD) Kelly Galanis Ilya Gaysinskiy Libardo Gerardino Said Ghusayni Michael Gillott Arvind Giridhar Mark Glotfelty Chloe Goddard Lakshya Goel Peter Goertzen Andres Gonzalez Clara Gonzalez-Martin Claire Goodeve Anton Gorshkov Simon Gosling Jessica Binder Graham Michael Graham (Securities) Glenn Greilsamer Fabrizio Grena Alain Griveau Pierre-Yves Guerber Renaud Guidée Renu Gupta Christoph Haenschel Simon Hale Jay Handfield Deirdre Harding Nada Hassan Frances Hawkins Tobias Heilmaier Christoph Heuer Kenneth Ho Luke Hodges Jennie Holloway Matthew Hostasa Henry Howell Soomin Hu Victor Hu Andrew Huang Lee Hughes Michael Hui Shinichiro Ichiki George Ingram Francesca Innocenti Karen Ip Yuichiro Isayama Shubha Iyer Kristy Jago Matt Jahansouz Lear Janiv Jessica Janowitz Franklin Jarman Jabe Jerram Lei Jin Moritz Jobke Charles Johnston Ganesh Jois Katherine Jollon Colsher John Jonke Shrut Kalra Emiko Kamoda Markus Kant Yugandhar Karna Lotfi Karoui Vanya Kasanof Ting Ke Kyle Kendall Richard Kendrick Corey Kenyon Anthony Kim Seong Eun Kim Sean Kingston Teresa Kingswood David Kirschner Michael Klym Jared Klyman Andrew Knight Timur Kocaoglu Kevin Kochar Christina Kopec David Korpi Caroline Kraus Jennifer Krevitt Ajay Kumar Raj Kumar Kosuke Kurosawa Marc Kurz Takashi Kuwano Loredana La Pace Phil Labbe Marco Laicini Vidya Lakshmi Lia Larson Kinger Lau Max Layton Jerome Lebuchoux Andrew Lee (GIR) David Lee (IMD) Jay Hyun Lee (MBD) Jerry Lee Shane Lee Valerie Leeder Panayiotis Lemonidis Joe Lenehan Daniel Levy Yael Levy Olga Lewis Christina Sun Li Chuan Li James Li Edmund Lim Stephen Little David Liu Daniel Lochner Michael Loetzsch Donald Lu Rochelle Lucas Matthias Ludemann Christopher Lvoff Andrew Lyons Kristen Macleod Manju Madhavan Lynn Magnus Thomas Malafronte Sajith Maliakel Rakesh Manani Elizabeth Mann Jim Mannoia John Manzi Jia Mao Guillaume Marinacce Jeremie Marrache Matthew Mason Gaurav Mathur Yuji Matsumoto Tom McAndrew Scott McHugh Andrew McIlroy Jenny Meng Shahmil Merchant Joann Mercurio Maryline Mertz Marco Messeri Hideo Michiba Jared Miller Stacey Miller Elizabeth Milonopoulos Pascal Mischler Pooja Mishra Prahlad Doretta Mistras Matthew Mizrahi Hillel Moerman Soren Moller-Rasmussen Fausto Monacelli Q Montazeri Leonie Morel Owen Morris Daniel Motta Ricardo Mourao Christian Mueller-Glissmann Niladri Mukhopadhyay Mathieu Munuera Francis Murphy Thomas Murray Charles Myers Harsh Nanda Asad Naqvi Ryan Nash David Naulty Toh Ne Win Shapour Neshatfar Billy Newport Anya Newton Katrina Niehaus Christos Nifadopoulos Ryan Nolan Brian Nordahl Steven Nowak Matthew O'Callaghan John Olivo Oscar Ostlund Marco Paesotto Kanak Palanisamy Sundaram Pandiarajan Mrudang Pandya Francesco Paolicelli Dhaval Parekh Keyur Parekh Akash Patel Himin Patel Jatin Patel Cristina Patron Nicholas Peach Agostina Pechi Xi Pei Shlomit Perry Joseph Persky Carlos Prieto Ricardo Puggina Tim Quandt Stephanie Rader Emilie Railhac Amit Raje Sudarshan Ramakrishnan Akila Raman Vishaal Rana Robert Rancitelli Zeeshan Razzaqui Paolo Re David Reis Kevin Relihan Ben Reuter Matt Rhodes Clare Richards Brian Richardson Richard Rivero Duane Robinson Fabiano Romeiro Agustin Romo Calvo Karen Rossi Matias Rotella Anne Russ C. Kyle Russ Jamie Russell Isidoor Rutten Timothy Ryan Craig Sabal Carolyn Sabat Michael Sachs Hassan Salamony Nicholas Saunders Carly Scales Marc Schaffer Tom Schouwenaars Jameson Schriber Leonard Seevers Masataka Sera Arpan Shah (Internal Audit) Dhruv Shah Nitin Shah Ashoke Sharma Nik Sharma Salil Sheth Jonathan Shugar Aaron Siegel Eric Siegel Julie Silverman Jim Sinclair Balaji Sivasubramanian Neil Slee Martin Smith (IMD) Scott Smith Lin Smyth Douglas Spell David Sprake Jack Springate Sujatha Srinivasan Ricardo Stabile John Startin John Stecher Alexander Stiles Peter Stone Miruna Stratan Matthew Straughen Hiroyuki Sugiura Joseph Sumberg Philip Sun Lawrence Tankel Richard Tarling Ian Taylor Mike Taylor (Services) Sophie Taylor Latifa Tefridj-Gaillard Kurt Tenenbaum Prasanna Thati Radha Tilton Vincent Tiseo Jandirk tom Dieck Margo Topman Shinsaku Toriyama Dom Totino Joseph Traina Matthew Traina Alexis Tsang Tetsuya Ukai Silvia Valente Laura van Alkemade Carol Van der Vorst Alexis Vassilakas Kerone Vatel Thomas Vaughan Meriel Vessey Alexandra Vincenzi David Wade Dennis Walsh Alex Wang Jun Wang Moon Wang Katherine Ward Amy Watson Peter Watson Whitney Watson Gregory Watts Jie Wei Michael Weiss Miriam Wheeler Pete Williams Wes Williams Jiahong Wu Tony Xu Michael Yaeger Satoshi Yamagata Huan Yang Jonathan Yarrow Sylvia Yeh Vincent Yeung Derek Yi Jon Yoder Jaewon Yu Brendan Zeigon Daniel Zimmerman Martin Zoll <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/seaworld-end-killer-whale-show-san-diego-blackfish-2015-11">SeaWorld is ending its killer whale show after being criticized for how it treats them</a></h3> <div> <div> <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="VjdnBxeDr7ABHNOUF_pwCshHV8m9AMwX" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div> </div> </div> </div>

The Goldman Sachs new managing director list is out!

BRUSSELS (AP) - European leaders united in anger as they attended a summit overshadowed by reports of widespread U.S. spying on its allies - allegations German Chancellor Angela Merkel said had shattered trust in the Obama administration and undermined the crucial trans-Atlantic relationship.
The latest revelations that the U.S. National Security Agency swept up more than 70 million phone records in France and may have tapped Merkel's own cellphone brought denunciations Thursday from the French and German governments.
Merkel's unusually stern remarks as she arrived at the European Union gathering indicated she wasn't placated by a phone conversation she had Wednesday with President <keyword id="15962" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Barack-Obama">Barack Obama</keyword>, or his personal assurances that the U.S. is not listening in on her calls now.
"We need trust among allies and partners," Merkel told reporters in Brussels. "Such trust now has to be built anew. This is what we have to think about."
"The United States of America and Europe face common challenges. We are allies," the German leader said. "But such an alliance can only be built on trust. That's why I repeat again: spying among friends, that cannot be."
The White House may soon face other irked heads of state and government. The British newspaper The Guardian said Thursday it obtained a confidential memo suggesting the <keyword id="38879" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="NSA">NSA</keyword> was able to monitor 35 world leaders' communications in 2006. The memo said the NSA encouraged senior officials at the White House, Pentagon and other agencies to share their contacts so the spy agency could add foreign leaders' phone numbers to its surveillance systems, the report said.
The Guardian did not identify who reportedly was eavesdropped on, but said the memo termed the payoff very meager: "Little reportable intelligence" was obtained, it said.
Other European leaders arriving for the 28-nation meeting echoed Merkel's displeasure. Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt called it "completely unacceptable" for a country to eavesdrop on an allied leader.
If reports that Merkel's cellphone had been tapped are true, "it is exceptionally serious," Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte told national broadcaster NOS.
"We want the truth," Italian Premier Enrico Letta told reporters. "It is not in the least bit conceivable that activity of this type could be acceptable."
Echoing Merkel, Austria's foreign minister, Michael Spindelegger, said, "We need to re-establish with the U.S. a relationship of trust, which has certainly suffered from this."
France, which also vocally objected to allies spying on each other, asked that the issue of reinforcing Europeans' privacy in the digital age be added to the agenda of the two-day summit. Before official proceedings got under way, Merkel held a brief one-on-one with French President Francois Hollande, and discussed the spying controversy.
After summit talks that lasted until after 1 a.m. Friday, Herman Van Rompuy, European Council president, announced at a news conference that France and Germany were seeking bilateral talks with the United States to resolve the dispute over electronic spying by "secret services" by the end of this year.
"What is at stake is preserving our relations with the United States," Hollande told reporters at his own early-morning news conference. "They should not be changed because of what has happened. But trust has to be restored and reinforced."
"It's become clear that for the future, something must change - and significantly," Merkel said. "We will put all efforts into forging a joint understanding by the end of the year for the cooperation of the (intelligence) agencies between Germany and the U.S., and France and the U.S., to create a framework for the cooperation."
The Europeans' statements and actions indicated that they hadn't been satisfied with assurances from Washington. On Wednesday, White House spokesman Jay Carney said Obama personally assured Merkel that her phone is not being listened to now and won't be in the future.
"I think we are all outraged, across party lines," Wolfgang Bosbach, a prominent German lawmaker from Merkel's party, told Deutschlandfunk radio. "And that also goes for the response that the chancellor's cellphone is not being monitored - because this sentence says nothing about whether the chancellor was monitored in the past."
"This cannot be justified from any point of view by the fight against international terrorism or by averting danger," Bosbach said.
Asked on hursday whether the Americans had monitored Merkel's previous communications, White House spokesman Carney wouldn't rule it out.
"We are not going to comment publicly on every specified alleged intelligence activity," he said.
But while the White House was staying publicly mum, Carney said the Obama administration was discussing Germany's concerns "through diplomatic channels at the highest level," as it was with other U.S. allies worried about the alleged spying.
Obama adviser for homeland security and counterterrorism Lisa Monaco wrote in an editorial for USA Today that the U.S. government is not operating "unrestrained."
The U.S. intelligence community has more restrictions and oversight than any other country, she wrote. "We are not listening to every phone call or reading every e-mail. Far from it."
Monaco noted that a privacy and civil liberties oversight board is reviewing counterterrorism efforts to ensure that privacy and civil liberties are protected.
"Going forward, we will continue to gather the information we need to keep ourselves and our allies safe, while giving even greater focus to ensuring that we are balancing our security needs with the privacy concerns all people share," she wrote.
In the past, much of the official outrage in Europe about revelations of U.S. communications intercepts leaked by former NSA contract worker <keyword id="1702690" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Edward-Snowden">Edward Snowden</keyword> seemed designed for internal political consumption in countries that readily acknowledge conducting major spying operations themselves. But there has been a new discernible vein of anger in Europe as the scale of the NSA's reported operations became known, as well as the possible targeting of a prominent leader like Merkel, presumably for inside political or economic information.
"Nobody in Germany will be able to say any longer that NSA surveillance - which is apparently happening worldwide and millions of times - is serving solely intelligence-gathering or defense against Islamic terror or weapons proliferation," said Hans-Christian Strobele, a member of the German parliamentary oversight committee.
Martin Schulz, president of the European Parliament, said Europe's undermined confidence in the U.S. meant it should suspend negotiations for a two-way free-trade agreement that would account for almost half of the global economy. The Americans, Schulz said, now must prove they can be trusted.
"Let's be honest. If we go to the negotiations and we have the feeling those people with whom we negotiate know everything that we want to deal with in advance, how can we trust each other?" Schulz said.
European Union Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said for many Europeans, eavesdropping on their phone calls or reading their emails is particularly objectionable because it raises the specter of totalitarian regimes of the recent past.
"At least in Europe, we consider the right to privacy a fundamental right and it is a very serious matter. We cannot, let's say, pretend it is just something accessory," Barroso told a presummit news conference.
Referring to the former East Germany's secret police, the feared Stasi, Barroso said, "to speak about Chancellor Merkel, in Germany there was a part of Germany where there was a political police that was spying on people's lives every day. So we know very recently what totalitarianism means. And we know very well what comes, what happens when the state uses powers that intrude in people's lives. So it is a very important issue, not only for Germany but for Europe in general."
In Berlin, the German Foreign Ministry summoned the U.S. ambassador to stress how seriously it takes the reported spying on Merkel. Germany's defense minister said his country and Europe can't return "to business as usual" with Washington, given the number of reports that the United States has eavesdropped on allied nations.
A German parliamentary committee that oversees the country's intelligence service met to discuss the spying allegations. Its head, Thomas Oppermann, recalled previous reports to the panel that U.S. authorities had denied violating German interests, and said, "we were apparently deceived by the American side."
Meanwhile, two Western diplomats told The Associated Press that U.S. officials have briefed them on documents obtained by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden that might expose their respective countries' levels of intelligence cooperation with the U.S.
The diplomats said the briefings came from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. The Washington Post said some of the documents Snowden took contain sensitive material about collection programs against adversaries including Iran, Russia and China. The diplomats spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the intelligence briefings publicly.
___
Moulson reported from Berlin. Associated Press writers Raf Casert and Juergen Baetz in Brussels, David Rising in Berlin, Cassandra Vinograd in London and Josh Lederman and Kimberly Dozier in Washington contributed to this report.
<div class="nc_footer">
Copyright (2013) Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
</div>

European Leaders Say Latest Spying Revelations Have Destroyed Their Trust In The US Government

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<div class="image-container float_right" style="width:400px"><div class="image"></div><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/josephadams/5777842715/">Flickr/JosephAdams</a></div>FROM the <keyword id="6359726" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="60" keywordseo="Colorado">Colorado</keyword> state capitol in Denver, head south on Broadway, one of the city’s main arteries, and before long you find yourself in "Broadsterdam", a cluster of dispensaries with names like Ganja Gourmet and Evergreen Apothecary.
They peddle dozens of strains of pot, as well as snacks, infusions and paraphernalia, to any state resident bearing a "red card": proof of a doctor’s recommendation.
Landlords in the area were struggling, says William Breathes (a pseudonym), whose reviews for a local paper make him, he says, America’s first mainstream pot critic. But when Colorado began to regulate the sale of <keyword id="40905" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Marijuana">marijuana</keyword> for medical use in 2010, they saw an opportunity.
Broadsterdam of 2013, and many places like it in America and Europe, would have been unimaginable in New York in 1961, when diplomats hammered out the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, which aimed to counter the "serious evil" of addiction. That treaty, with 184 countries signed up, underpins the prohibition policy of the past half century. Though an international debate on legalisation has barely started, experiments are already showing how the production and consumption of drugs could be regulated.
Change is coming because the "war on drugs" is being convincingly won by drugs, and the powerful criminal gangs who deal in them. Since 1998, when the UN held an event entitled "A drug-free world: we can do it", consumption of cannabis (marijuana) and cocaine has risen by about 50%; for opiates, it has more than trebled. And a swelling pharmacopoeia of synthetic highs is spinning heads in dizzying new ways. The UN reckons that 230m people used illegal drugs in 2010. They and their suppliers (usually the humblest ones) fill prisons in rich and poor countries alike. Drug convictions account for almost half of American prisoners in federal jails.
<h3>Burned at both ends</h3>
If efforts to stem demand have been futile, trying to control supply has been disastrous. The illegal-drug industry’s revenues are some $300 billion a year, according to the very roughest of guesses by the UN, and flow untaxed into criminal hands. Drug-running mafias corrupt and destroy the places where they operate. Of the world’s eight most murderous countries, seven lie on the cocaine-trafficking route from the Andes to the United States and Europe. Only war zones are more violent than Honduras. More than 7,000 of its 8m citizens are murdered each year. In the European Union, with a 500m population, the figure is under 6,000.
Latin American leaders are tiring of this. Trying to stop the flow of narcotics is akin to the legendary Sisyphus futilely pushing a boulder uphill, says Fernando Carrera, Guatemala’s foreign minister. In recent years his country has laboriously cleared its San Marcos region of opium crops, only to see it replanted five times. The president, Otto Pérez Molina, now wants to see global legal regulation of all drugs, from hashish to heroin, albeit with strict controls. Juan Manuel Santos, president of Colombia, favours legalisation, but says that his country cannot lead the way. Last year Felipe Calderón, the outgoing president of Mexico, declared it "impossible" to stop the drugs business and called for "market alternatives". Uruguay’s government has sent to congress a bill to legalise the sale of pot through state-backed dispensaries. Smokers would be allowed to buy up to 40g per week, with profits funding crime-prevention and anti-addiction schemes.
In parts of the United States, change has already come. In November voters in Colorado and <keyword id="6354998" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Washington">Washington</keyword> backed proposals to legalise, tax and regulate cannabis for recreational use. State officials are now scrambling to draft the practical rules. On February 28th a task force charged with producing recommendations for the Colorado legislature will issue its report.
Though non-binding, this will be the first glimpse of what a fully formed regulatory regime for legal cannabis may look like. Although plenty of countries (and 15 American states) have decriminalised cannabis possession, in many cases treating it as no worse than a traffic infraction, nowhere has fully legalised its supply. Within a year the entire supply chain in Colorado and Washington, from cultivation to manufacture to retail, will be within the law. State coffers will gain tax and fee revenues and save in law-enforcement resources (maybe $60m a year in Colorado). Licensed outlets will appear on the streets.
Assuming, of course, that the federal government consents. Marijuana remains illegal under America’s Controlled Substances Act, the 1970 law that implemented the Single Convention in the United States and that is still the foundation of federal narcotics policy. The CSA classifies it as a "Schedule I" substance, meaning it can easily be abused and has no recognised medical value. (A federal appeals court recently rejected an attempt to have it reclassified.)
In December Eric Holder, the attorney-general, said that the justice department would issue a response to the state laws "relatively soon". But for the time being the department says only that it is reviewing the state initiatives, and that marijuana remains illegal under federal law. Shortly after Mr Holder’s statement, Barack Obama told a television interviewer that he would not make it a priority to prosecute pot smokers in the two states. But the federal government has never had the resources to target users, only big traffickers.
One clue to the future comes from the 18 states plus Washington, DC, where medical marijuana is legal. The Feds have come down hard on some growers and distributors in states that have drafted their laws poorly. In 1996 California was the first state to approve medical marijuana but lawsuits clog the courts, competing regulatory ballot measures confuse voters, and in some cities pushy dispensaries unnerve residents. In better-regulated places (like Colorado) the federal authorities have done little. A big issue will be leakage of legal marijuana from Colorado or Washington to other states. After meeting Mr Holder in January, Jay Inslee, the governor of Washington, told reporters that the state would pay particular attention to this.
For some, that is a futile gesture. "We’ll become the source for most of the rest of the country," says a weary Tom Gorman, of the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug-Trafficking Area, a federal anti-drug outfit in Denver. Last year it tracked dozens of cases of diversion of Colorado’s medical marijuana, finding it in 23 states. Legalisation will add to the flow.
Yet diversion also makes life more difficult for the criminal gangs of Mexico, which are reckoned to supply anything between 40% and 70% of America’s pot. Their trade reaps profits of $2 billion a year according to IMCO, a Mexico City think-tank; cocaine profits are $2.4 billion. Part of the business model is murder: of around 70,000 people over the past five years. But IMCO reckons that once Colorado and Washington’s growers get going, the Mexicans could lose nearly three-quarters of their American customers (though others question these numbers).
Much will depend on how the state laws take shape. The Colorado task force has already suggested letting retailers serve non-residents, possibly in limited amounts. It also wants to relax restrictions on financial services for the industry. Many dispensaries struggle to obtain even basic banking and credit.
<h3>Trying to stay upright</h3>
Jack Finlaw and Barbara Brohl, who chair the task-force, are also pondering the "vertical integration" rules that have shaped the state’s medical-marijuana industry. Dispensaries must grow at least 70% of the marijuana they sell. Some cultivate it in-house; most grow it in off-site warehouses. This hampers distribution and wholesale markets. Rob Corry, a pro-legalisation lawyer, terms it "absurd, like a supermarket owning apple orchards". As elsewhere, tight rules have costs. But they have also helped citizens get used to an unfamiliar trade. "We’ve shown that we can make the industry work here," says Ean Seeb of Denver Relief, a leading dispensary.
Public acceptance, plus a clever campaign (paid for partly by outside money), led to victory in Colorado. Washington’s medical-marijuana industry is less advanced, but opponents of legalisation there were even more widely outspent.
More changes are looming. As with gay marriage (see chart), something that seemed revoltingly decadent to many Americans in past years has rapidly won acceptance. Campaigners are seeking further wins, mainly in the relatively liberal states of the west and north-east. Some dare to dream of changing federal law.
Their foe is the mighty prohibition industry: officials and bureaucrats who have spent their professional lives combating illegal drugs. Law-enforcement officers and Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) officials have written to Mr Holder urging him to uphold federal law. Yet others counter that legalising pot will boost consumption, particularly if it can be advertised and marketed. That brings fears of health and other risks. Others counter that smoking more dope would mean people drank less alcohol, which is arguably a more destructive drug. But the effect could be the other way round. What legal pot would mean for tobacco and cocaine use is also unknown.
Cannabis policy is changing in Europe, too. At Santa María, a shop across the street from one of Madrid’s main hospitals, customers queue to buy fertilisers, potting earth and imported Dutch cannabis seeds. The owner, Pedro Pérez, cheerfully warns customers not to plant until late in March when the frosts have gone.
Spain’s approach now rivals that of the pioneering liberal Dutch. Though selling is illegal, buying is not. One result is hundreds of cannabis "social clubs", which allow members to pool their purchases. These range from small co-operatives where new members must wait six months for new cannabis to be grown before joining, to huge semi-commercial organisations, with thousands of "members" buying cannabis. One in Barcelona even made a €1.3m ($1.74m) deal with the country town of Rasquera to grow supplies on local land, better known for its almond trees. Similar experiments are under way in France, Belgium, Italy and Germany, says Tom Blickman of the Transnational Institute, a think-tank based in Amsterdam. In much of Britain, especially its big cities, the risk of prosecution for those using small quantities of soft drugs is vanishingly low.
But the most comprehensive policy comes from Portugal. In 1997 opinion polls rated drug use the country’s biggest social problem. Now, 12 years since the decriminalisation of personal use of small amounts (meaning less than ten days’ worth) of all drugs, it ranks 13th. All parties now support the policy of treating drug use as a health issue, not a crime. HIV rates have plummeted, too, says João Goulão, the national drugs co-ordinator.
But decriminalisation is not the same as legalisation. Portugal uses "dissuasion boards", made up of doctors, psychologists and other specialists. They aim to get addicts into treatment and to prevent recreational users from falling into addiction. When necessary they can impose fines and community work. By removing the "fear and stigma" of criminal punishment, says Mr Goulão, drug users are encouraged to seek the help they need.
Brendan Hughes, of the Lisbon-based European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA), an agency of the European Union, says Portugal stands out for its "consistency and comprehensiveness". Other countries wanting to focus on health have only "tweaked" their criminal laws, he says.
In 2009 the Czech Republic decriminalised possession of most drugs along Portuguese lines. In December it went further, fully legalising medicinal cannabis. The plan is for imports--probably Dutch or Israeli--to be sold in pharmacies, says Jindrich Voboril, the head of the government drugs council. If that works, it will then license a number of competing companies to grow supplies locally.
<h3>The elusive molecules</h3>
The other big policy innovation in Europe has been to drop punitive policies in dealing with heroin and cocaine addiction, in favour of harm reduction (see box). But a much bigger worry now is the rise of legal highs. The EMCDDA reports that a new psychoactive substance is found weekly, on average. These concoctions are openly marketed as "plant food" or "research chemicals". Mephedrone and ketamine--both legal highs until recently--have become mainstream clubbing drugs in Britain, taken alongside ecstasy and cocaine. Tim Hollis of the British Association of Chief Police Officers says that the police are "flat-footed" trying to keep up. Many of the new drugs do more harm than the illegal narcotics that they are replacing.
The legal regime governing cocaine is more controversial. Some countries, including Portugal, Mexico and Colombia, have decriminalised the possession of small doses of the drug, referring users to treatment rather than giving them a criminal record. But the harm cocaine does to health and its addictive nature make governments queasy about legalising its sale.
High in the Andes, regulated cultivation for "traditional" use (coca leaves give a mild caffeine-like buzz and suppress hunger, cold and altitude sickness) has been going on for decades. In Trinidad Pampa, a tiny village in Bolivia’s mountainous Yungas region, the hillsides are divided into neat terraces, where coca saplings are planted after being cultivated in beds enriched with rice-husks and sand. The whole village is involved. Children and even toddlers help their parents.
The 1961 narcotics convention banned coca along with cocaine (albeit with a long transitional period). But on January 11th Bolivia became the first country to negotiate a partial opt-out from the treaty. It was readmitted with a get-out clause for coca, having resigned last year over the ban on what its president, Evo Morales, calls the "sacred leaf". A former coca-grower and union leader, he enjoys grandstanding against America (he expelled its ambassador in 2008 along with DEA officials).
In 2004, following protests by coca growers led by Mr Morales (then in opposition), Bolivia brought most of its 28,000 hectares of coca fields within the law. The government claims that increases in population and heavy use among miners and truckers justify the extra growing-permits. But sales figures suggest that in fact most coca goes elsewhere. Leaves must be sold in state-controlled markets, which in 2011 bought just over 18,000 tonnes from farmers. The UN estimates that potential production was about 48,000 tonnes. Most of the missing 30,000 tonnes leaked into the cocaine business, reckons César Guedes, head of the UN drugs office in La Paz.
This alarms Bolivia’s neighbours. Brazil believes it has the world’s second-biggest market (after America) for cocaine and the largest for crack; most of Brazil’s cocaine imports come from Bolivia. Usage of crack is up in Argentina, too.
Yet keeping Bolivia outside the treaty was "infinitely more dangerous" than bringing it in, says an official from a nearby country. Supply increased a little after the regime was relaxed in 2004, before levelling out in 2008 and dropping by about 12% in 2011, to beneath 2004 levels. Letting farmers get on with it has allowed Bolivia to focus scarce police resources on organised crime. In 2011 it destroyed more than 5,000 cocaine processing factories, five times more than a decade earlier (though that could also show that trafficking has increased). Coca farmers still have a difficult relationship with the authorities in some parts of the country, but the abuses that accompanied the military-led eradication efforts of the 1990s have lessened.
Partial reforms have their limits. Most drug crime is not cannabis-related. Moving from punishment to harm reduction may help drug users, but it leaves gangsters in control of supplies and revenues. Many countries still stick to prohibition.
The votes in Colorado and Washington were hardly imaginable ten years ago and make deeper change likely. They weaken the Single Convention, the illegal trade, and the prohibition industry that feeds on it. Peter Reuter, an expert at the University of Maryland, says America should "evaluate the experiment and put up with international condemnation for a couple of years." Even that counts as progress.
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